Is it leg day yet?!
Richard Dickinson demonstrating walking lunges in the fitness room at the end of his leg session a while ago.
Walking lunges are a great exercise to finish off your legs and offer a number of benefits. As well as building muscle they help with balance, coordination, core work, flexibility and fitness...all strengths which carry over to other exercises and every day life. Read more below.
Taking longer strides will work the glutes and hamstrings more along with hip and lower leg flexibility. Shorter strides help to target the quads more. When you push up, try to feel the target muscle squeeze and do the work rather than just throwing yourself up.
Carry the weight on your back like Rich does or hold weights in each hand. Either way keep your chest high, core tight, look ahead and don't allow your back to round. If you don't feel stable enough to carry your strides straight through one to the next, pause at the centre before taking your next step.
To make walking lunges more challenging slow down each portion of your stride, a bit like you're walking on the moon! Progress each session by adding more weight or doing more lengths.
Strong glutes can help with hip and knee stability which is particularly important during day to day unilateral movements such as climbing stairs and getting around in general....and because they are a unilateral movement themselves, walking lunges can help to identify and build up weaknesses on a particular side.
If you have any knee stability issues and haven't done these before I would suggest starting off with step ups or static lunges where the joint/ligaments won't be as compromised, with the aim of progressing to walking lunges as strength builds.
If you find your knees cave in during lunges or squat movements then it is likely that you are weak on the glutes and/or abductor muscles which help to keep our knees driven out during such movements. Make sure you use the abductor machine (the one that takes your legs outward) on leg day, it's not just for ladies you know!
There are also some great band variations to help with this, give me a shout if you would like to try them.
It's legs for us tonight, and yes I will be doing walking lunges 😎
Train hard and see you soon
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